


Gifted, Cursed

by GenericUsername01



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Arranged Marriage, Fairy Tale Curses, M/M, Magical Realism, NO historical accuracy and NO period-typical anything, ill give this a rating eventually just lemme figure it out first, magical powers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-02
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-20 08:47:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18989266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GenericUsername01/pseuds/GenericUsername01
Summary: When John was twelve, he was a stable boy at the palace, and he happened to save the royal family's lives one day. He was rewarded beyond compare with great honor, a knighthood, and an apprenticeship for the Royal Guard.When he was seventeen, he did it again, and the queen topped the previous reward the only way she knew how:She gave John a title and her son's hand in marriage.





	Gifted, Cursed

**Author's Note:**

> I realize I shouldn't be starting another wip when I already have over twenty. In fairness, YOU also should not be reading another one of my wips when I am clearly the world's most unreliable author, so there.

He woke up at least an hour before dawn, as always, and shoved Harry aside in their shared bed. She grunted and mumbled insults at him, but not loud enough to wake their mother in her own bed just two feet away.

John lit a lantern kept by the door of their cramped servants' quarters. He unlatched the trunk at the foot of the bed and rooted around find some clean-ish clothes for himself. Within a few minutes, his mother and sister had risen as well, getting up with muted resolve and throwing on their own servants' garb: plain brown frocks that covered them from neck to wrists to ankles, and simple, undyed aprons. John's clothing was basically the masculine version: equally simple fabric but with a more complicated cut, forming breeches and tunics and stockings.

He and Harry bickered and shoved at each other, lightly, quietly. Their mother rolled aching joints and pinched her eyes shut, strain obvious in her features.

They filed out of the tiny room together and then John peeled off, heading outside to the stables, his mother and sister headed to the kitchen.

* * *

The palace stables were massive. Rows and rows of stalls in a building big enough to house a town, in John's opinion. Not all of the horses were technically the queen's, however. Most of them belonged to upper members of the Royal Guard. Though that essentially meant they belonged to the queen by proxy. If she so wished, she could just take any of those horses, declare it to be for her private use, and forbid anyone else from riding it.

She didn't, though, and likely wouldn't. The queen didn't seem to care much for riding.

John loved the horses.

They were all good boys and girls, and-- in his opinion-- were not given nearly enough time with which to spend running freely through grassy fields. Sure, they had some to do that. But a horse should spend most of its time like that, not just a portion. They should not spend so much time cooped up in stalls or ordered through restricted riding motions.

Sometimes the older stablehands teased John, saying that if he could he would free all the horses to live in the wild, and he'd probably go with them. Old Richards liked to joke that John was half-wildling at heart.

The queen's stables hold 37 horses, two of whom are currently pregnant. John knows all of them by name, personality, and temperament. He knows that fourteen are already out of their stalls that morning: two taken by extremely early-rising knights, and twelve out on carriage-pulling duty from days before, in two separate teams. Ten of said carriage-pullers were due back today, in the early morning, and it was John's job to be ready to greet them when they arrived and promptly see to the horses. Well, John and two other kids: Oweyn and Masse, siblings, ages eight and nine.

The person to be arriving back in the carriage was none other than Crown Prince Mycroft, aged fifteen, returning from his solo tour of the countryside that would be his one day. He had been sent off by his father to spend a year travelling Nyrity, familiarizing himself with its cities and noble courts-- even its smaller farming towns had not escaped notice.

It was a novel idea, introducing a future sovereign to his people. Usually, a crown prince or princess stayed at their family seat until they came of age, and knew only what their books said of their kingdom, and met only the nobles high and lofty enough to be invited to the royal court on occasion. Queen Violet's decision to send her son out to see all his lands and meet all his people and learn the realities of their lives, as it were, was met with scorn and scandalization by the more traditional nobles. There were wild rumors flying about-- that the crown prince would be killed, robbed, returned half-dead and never the same, that the common man would melt his brain with their barbarism and sinful magical practices, that he would come back as a feral half-wolf, as God only knew what horrors lurked in the countryside.

The stablemaster, Barthollemy, had been very clear. The three of them were not to say anything to the prince. They were not to look at the prince. They were not to whisper to themselves, speculating about the prince's travels. They were to immediately and silently unhitch the horses and lead them to the stables to be brushed down, fed, and watered, all without making eye contact with themselves or anyone else. Barthollemy had added an additional instruction that Oweyn was not to pick his nose when within sight of the prince, please, for the love of God, or so help him, Barthollemy will fire both him and his sister.

And now, the three youngest stablehands were standing around waiting at the palace gates, while the adults and older kids got on with their real work.

Oweyn was picking his nose. Masse slapped her little brother's hand away.

John heard footsteps approaching behind him, and turned to see the royal family approach: the queen, her consort, and little Prince Sherlock, no older than Oweyn himself. John immediately straightened, fixing his eyes on the road before him, and brushed Masse's hand to get her attention. Her eyes widened, and she hurriedly whispered something in her brother's ear before they both straightened in imitation of John.

The royal family stood in the center of the paved cobblestone road, about thirty feet back from the gates. They murmured quietly amongst themselves, and John was valiantly not eavesdropping, while he and the two other stablehands were focusing all of their efforts into not fidgeting or shifting too much during this, the world's longest wait.

It was maybe ten minutes before they could see the carriage winding through the trees. The royal family's personal carriage, painted black and trimmed with gold leaf, the flag of Nyrity atop each corner, adorned with banners of the royal colors, pulled by four stately white horses whose manes and tails had been braided immaculately. It was merely the first of a caravan of four. The other carriages were much less fine, and held only luggage and a small fleet of the crown prince's personal attendants.

John ushered the other kids back a bit, out of the way of the caravan, and then--

A horse spooked.

A horse spooked, and snapped free of its reins, and the three other horses drawing Prince Mycroft's carriage all started and attempted to pull away and run, and they barreled through the palace gates.

John ran ahead of them as fast as his legs could carry, stopping in front of the royal family just in time to throw up his hand and shout a command. One of the horses listened, the one behind collided into it, and the third remaining horse tried to tear off to the side in confusion. The horse that had listened tried to rear back, and ended up getting very much tangled with its partner.

By now, other servants had noticed the commotion, and stablehands poured out onto the grounds, dealing with the two tangled, panicking horses, rounding up the two runaways, trying desperately to calm the rest of the ruffled caravan.

John stayed exactly where he was, chest heaving, heart hammering like a hummingbird. He dropped his hand to his side, feeling awkward.

The crown prince burst out of his carriage, giving all of the horses a wide berth, and then-- gracefully-- speedwalked over to his family.

The queen crushed him to her chest, cooing and saying nothings. The crown prince was talking simultaneously, much slower and calmer, and the littlest prince squawking loudly, flailing his arms about, and generally trying to get as much attention as possible.

Prince Mycroft said something and suddenly the whole family went silent. And stared at John.

John, in that moment, realized that he absolutely should not be staring and in fact, should be helping with the great deal of work that needed to be done. Even Masse and Oweyn had disappeared somewhere, off to work on fixing the current horse crisis.

He nodded shortly, face burning, and turned to walk away. He could only hope they were too distracted to care much about his impertinence.

Apparently not, as heels clicked rapidly on cobblestone and a silk-gloved hand tapped him on the shoulder. John froze and turned.

He bowed deeply. "Your Majesty," he said. "I apologize for staring, I forgot where I was for a moment. It won't happen again, Your Majesty."

"I care not about that," she said. "You have saved our lives. Were it not for your brave actions, myself and my family would have been trampled, our dear son Mycroft scarred by trauma. The crown of Nyrity owes you its life."

John swallowed. "Um," he said. "It was... no problem, really. It's my job to... mind the horses."

The queen stared at him. Sweat prickled down the back of his neck.

"It is the wish of every queen to have subjects as brave and loyal as you are," she said. "You are a rare gem, er... What is your name?"

"John," he said. "John Watson."

"You are a rare gem, John Watson. I'll not have you go to waste mucking horse shit for the rest of your life. No, to save the lives of the royal family is an act that must be encouraged and rewarded. If half my knights were as honorable as you... Yes. It's settled then. You are to be knighted immediately and set into training for the Royal Guard. I'll see to it as soon as I've got my son settled in from his journey. Dismissed."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey I have no clue how that royal consort thing works when it isn't gay. Would Siger be called King Consort or Queen Consort? He's the Queen's Consort but that phrase very pointedly doesn't have a possessive in it. I know I can't just call him the King because it needs to be clear that Violet is the real power and the royal bloodline runs through her. I am so very confused. I have written so many fairytale aus, but somehow I have come across this extremely complicated straight people issue before
> 
> Any thoughts would be helpful, even if they have no basis in fact. God knows this fic doesn't


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